Coaching - The Ultimate Thread
I have been a coach for a number of years now and throughout those years I have had a number of experiences which contributed to my development at doing what I do. Instead of these thoughts and experiences rattling around in my brain a couple of years ago I made the decision to write them down, that’s where my blog was born. Many hours and beers went to dreaming up a name for such a uniform resource locator. These wonders of coaching would be written into the stars, eventually thecoachingcolumn.net was engraved onto the records of a well known and interesting domain registration site. I’m told that the hits I have received, word press related features tell me there have been over 100,000 of them, have made it all the way to an academy in Florida so technically worldwide (which is exciting) and also made it locally to some of my friends in the coaching world.
So, all this basically means is that it makes me incredibly proud to present to you the fact that some of these ideas, original or stolen, have contributed to the development of some young and old players in the UK and further away.
Professionalism Before Football
First and primary thought process before we actually get into the football aspect of things, I often spoke of professionalism. In my time I have met many a coach who makes a point of arguing with referee’s on a regular basis, showing up to matchday with a bad attitude towards opposition, generally creating a toxic atmosphere. Keeping in mind this is through experience.
An interesting thought occurred recently, throughout my time as being a coach I often spent time thinking about certain aspects of conduct and so on, one that confused me the most is arguing with the referee.
Not something I spend anytime doing as personally I feel that in this case you would lose the respect of the referee, also on a more superficial basis it isn’t like the referee is going to listen and decide to change his mind based on your argument, the decision is final and he will not be persuaded based on your argument. As the great Brian Clough once said:
“People forget the referee doesn’t have a slow motion eyeball”
Matchday Conduct
Another aspect in terms of applying professionalism is your conduct on match day, go and meet the opposition management/coaching staff, shake a few hands and have a social conversation. Ensure that your demeanour is positive and enthusiastic, this is turn I have found that you will earn your immediate respect from the opposition.
During the match if the opposition have some injured personnel you may find yourself in a position where you have better medical supplies available to you, take the opportunity to share this. It is your job to be there for the well being of your players, and everyone else there. I have found myself in this position before and it is an important aspect of demonstrate.
This will develop a positive reputation on yourself and to be honest I don’t find any of these demands strenuous, do you?
There can be occasions, and don’t get me wrong they are rare, where the opposition are highly disrespectful, where teams argue everything, generally do everything in their power to breach the unwritten rules of sportsmanship. This may anger you or frustrate you, keep it in mind that this is not your problem, work towards maintaining your established high values and standards in terms of your attitude and conduct.
A Rondo For A Minute
This is a routine that I love, I spend time using it every week and it has provided me with an end product, please spend time adapting it to your own requirement or just simply use it as it. Each drill that will be explained is set out on the principles below. There will be more routines littered throughout this book/bits of paper/brochure.
Layout
Based on 10 players we will have 2 rondo boxes 7×7 although the spaces can be expanded depending on the amount of players you have.
Action
Split the players into 5 and 5 – create a 4 v 1 in each rondo box – time the routine to 1 minute each and leave balls around the parameter of the boxes to ensure the players have free access to footballs. The reason for this is to encourage the players to be responsible for the routine they are taking part in, also improves the fluidity of the routing cutting down on the stop start problems that can often occur.
Outcome
A rondo can be adapted for several focuses, this one we will use the ball movement focus, part of your standard would be to make that point during the routine to your players. Other occasions you can perhaps make some changes to the rondo to focus on a different development.
Notes, Ideas & Nuggets
This section is essentially a collection of notes and ideas which can be used to add to your knowledge base. A few of them might provide a baseline to add to what you already know.
The following is just a collection of ideas, I hope these golden nuggets of wonderful information prove productive.
- “Picked up from the world of Futsal. Ball goes out of play the team in possession has to bring the ball back into play within 4 second or they have to hand over possession. Encourages quick thinking and impact opposition's ability to regroup and organise”
- “Really simple idea, sometimes you will see kids or adults time wasting pre-session, common occurrence and to be fair understandable. Decent attention spans are nowhere to be seen, so a recommendation would be simply to implement a rule, do what you want pre-session whether it be chat or whatever, as long as you have a football at your feet”
- “Corner taking is an important aspect of football, ideas on how to mix it up a little is always ideal. Have a player work with your regular corner taker to come short with a decoy run. This drags the opposition player out of the game, provides a potential advantage”
- “Evolution of coaching these days has introduced more and more terminology, a new one is SAQ. Which is of course Speed Agility and Quickness. A standardized layout is an ideal option, three channel and split your team into three groups. Use one of the channels for ladders, another of zigzags and last simply quick feet. When time expires everyone moves to their left. Again this is open to customization, ideas to suit your team’s development”
- “A player doing keepy uppy with a rugby ball… Why would they do this I hear you ask? The key part of a rugby ball is its shape, if you ask one of your kids to try this sort of thing, the unpredictability of where the ball will end up will demand the players mind to work harder, this in turn develop the player’s anticipation and first touch. The application has been used regularly with goalkeepers, former Swansea player Michel Armand Vorm regularly voiced his appreciation for this concept”
- “Always remain open minded to the potential versatility of a player, have a look at what the player can and can’t do. Maintaining that state of mind may work to your advantage, what is your problem, what alternative’s do you have at your disposal, think what alternatives do you have and what further alternatives are your afraid to use. Take the risk as there will be the reward. At what point does this disallow you from adding the player to the potential position?”
- “Why are there always shapes involved in the routines we do, triangles and squares and so on? Football is often played in squares and triangles, the routines are set out to look the same”
Coaching Journey
This was written a long time ago which I have recently updated, the basis was simply when I was a kid there was very little information online or offline in terms of how to get to the point of considering yourself an actual coach. When I managed to achieve that status I thought to offer up some text to fill in that gap and answer those questions, these days perhaps not as relevant as before but its important to share these thoughts non the less.
I know that is written in a way that is slightly patronising…
Step 2 – Experience
The next step, and one of the most important, is gathering experience. This is where you get the opportunity to establish your own approach, building blocks to work alongside your own researching of ideas and information, study the finer details of the game, and learn how to deal with individuals and groups of players in your own way.
Personally I worked on a freelance basis, I made a point of visiting a variety of clubs and expressed my own thoughts and feelings towards how routines and drills worked and in what way the players would learn from it. I benefited from it as it allowed me to fine tune my own approach in terms of how to express these ideas.
Step 3 – New Ideas
A fundamental problem that still exists within British football is the recurrence of long term and established members, they come armed with a closed minded state in terms of new ideas, claims made that routines work because they are tried and trust so evolution of football should be ignored entirely.
Remain open to new ideas, a key example that I always make a reference to is Raymond Verheijen (Twitter @raymondverhieje) — a pioneer of fitness development based on the principle of high intensity over a short period of time. His work reached a level where Dick Advocaat brought him in to work with his South Korean side, paid through his own earnings.
Step 4 – Networking
Sadly a one of the biggest flaws of the sports industry is sometimes it is not about what you know, rather WHO you know. I used as many social networking options as possible (facebook, twitter, e-mail, LinkedIn, etc) to network with clubs and people.
Make an effort to evolve with existing social media, newly developed tools available to you should be used straightaway.
Step 5 – Personality
Be proud of your work and focus on new and fresh ideas. Scottish sport is developing to shake off the stereotypical arrogant coach, who swaggers in claiming to know everything there is to know about coaching and will not be undermined at any point.
Don’t be that person. Remain open-minded. Do not be afraid to consider yourself still learning.
Key and most important part is: remain positive.
Academy Thoughts…
The following is some information I picked up through experience.
A recent development that I witnessed was a restructuring of an academy. Presents several challenges, including accommodating a massive range of abilities.
It is scientifically proven that players with similar ability will progress more quickly, avoiding a sense of intimidation. If you are provided with the opportunity to separate the players into groups, ensure you avoid using words like elite and development and so on. This I have found has a detrimental effect on players’ confidence despite their varying abilities. Suggestions I would say to you would be to use shirt colours, or I have recently seen clubs using recurring European words like Milan, Rovers, or Wanderers.
The third team can become a bit of an experiment for you. If you are still enjoying an influx of players this can be used as a platform for football — an experience perhaps for younger players to experience being part of a team, to experience pitch-side environment and the right attitudes to show. You could use this team as a sort of exhibition group, send them to be part of tournaments, training abroad, then you could use it as a platform to recruit further players.
More and more we are seeing some basic coaching drop-in sessions, effectively this is used simply for people to get a taste of football without the pressure and intimidation of other experienced players — something that is proven to be a productive concept.
Academy Staff Ideas…
- Minimum 3 coaches per age group — this allows training sessions to flow and for it to be a more enjoyable experience for each one of the players. You can never grow short of coaches.
- The better quality the training sessions, the more chance you have of player retention.
I don't know what access you have, but have a chat with your local educational school. A common thing that happens here is on a short-term basis a lot of physiotherapists are sourced from universities or colleges in Scotland. It allows the students to enjoy some real-life experiences using their knowledge and gives the club some professional protection against potential injuries.
Apply the same idea and principle to other potential roles within your club. Good examples would be:
- sports analysts
- personal trainers
- coaches
- medical related subjects
and so on.
This sort of text again is purely through experience and ideas that have either been presented by me or perhaps ideas that have shown up through conversation. Take the information and again don’t take it literally, consider the idea — potentially reshape, reconstruct, reorganise or simply use it as is. What matters is whether it is useful to you.
Coaching Delivery
This was an idea I came up with to improve my delivery, this was during nights when I was bored with college work, cables and computers and wanted to invest some time in something else.
When delivering a routine consider three statements:
- What do you need for that drill in terms of kit and people.
- Explain the action in the drill.
- Point of the routine, what do we learn from that exercise.
Hashtag Rondo
“Everything that goes on in a match, except shooting, you can do in a rondo. The competitive aspect, fighting to make space, what to do when in possession and what to do when you haven’t got the ball, how to play ‘one touch’ soccer, how to counteract the tight marking and how to win the ball back.”
— Johan Cruyff
Timing of Games
You have 90 minutes training available to you.
To start with complete your standard warm up, then emphasizing the point of interval training, start the session with a small game. After 15 minutes, stop the game for a breather, water intake and reshuffle the teams.
- Maintains freshness
- Improves fitness
- Remember you have the opportunity to play with the idea.
Conditioning
I picked this up from the world of Futsal.
Ball goes out of play → the team in possession has to bring the ball back into play within 4 seconds or they have to hand over possession.
Encourages quick thinking and impacts the opposition’s ability to regroup and organise.
Waving to Football
Another routine that worked out quite nicely for me, highly flexible also.
Split your group into 2 teams, one with bibs. Start with having one team attack vs defence. In order to keep the intensity of the routine up, ensure the pool of footballs is accessed immediately once the active ball leaves the pitch.
When you run out of footballs, get the 2 teams to go and start shuttle running, afterwards switch the attacking team to defending and vice versa – once completed do another set of shuttle runs.
The idea behind it is to get the players to adapt to a sense of intensity, the routine can be adapted to suit younger or older age groups.